The Sarasota Environmental Aquatics (SEA) Team is a group of Sarasota County volunteers whose work has made positive
impacts on our bays. Whether they are seeding scallops or surveying seagrass, this team of energetic volunteers provides scientists with valuable
information.Seagrass survey volunteers boat or kayak Sarasota’s bays and document the types of seagrass they see. Seagrass is vital to maintaining
healthy aquatic ecosystems, stabilizing shorelines and providing food and shelter for a variety of wildlife, including scallops, manatees and sea turtles.
The information gathered by seagrass survey volunteers allows scientists to better understand and manage these important ecosystems.
Many volunteers find surveying seagrass fun, easy and rewarding.

Requirements: Attend a two-hour training session and be available a few days during the months of February or August. Note: Volunteers should have their own GPS, boat or kayak, but when possible, those who do not will be paired with those who do.

In this issue, Rudi has kindly included a compilation of events and sightings during the recent oil spill in Singapore. It basically consolidates much of the information that is available on the Oil Spill facebook group, and on wild shores of singapore posts about the oil spill.I was eagerly looking forward to Len's valuable insights and information on what happens when crude oil hits seagrasses. Len explains that seagrasses are not so much affected by the "more spectacular oil slick" but are primarily harmed by "the absorption of seawater-soluble fraction (SWSF) of oil." This SWSF thing is a kind of cocktail of dissolved or suspended tiny bits of icky hydrocarbons. Toxic bits are "thought to be able to pass from the SWSF" into seagrass blades where they tend to accumulate in the chloroplasts, the stuff that allows seagrasses to undergo photosynthesis.Another possible consequence of an oil spill is a bloom of algae (seaweed) which can smother seagrasses. It may take a year before things return to normal on a seagrass meadow, and there may be lingering "sublethal" effects for five years or more. Len ends by saying that our understanding of oil spill impact on seagrasses is limited because "there is a general lack of substantial long-term field data" before and after an oil spill.

Thus, the work that TeamSeagrass has done monitoring Chek Jawa's seagrasses well before the oil spill will hopefully allow us to better understand the impact of oil spills here and elsewhere too!

The lead feature of this issue explores the important issue of putting an economic value to seagrasses: "Many would argue that ecological systems are 'priceless'. However, by not valuing natural resources, when decisions are made, the value may be assumed to be zero" begins the authors in the introduction.

The article discusses the why and how of pricing seagrass meadows. And provides a table of some astonishing values.

What is a sea urchin? Heart urchins and cake urchins are just some of the many species of sea urchins. These unusual animals provide an endless source of fascination. They are closely related to sea stars, sharing the same five-fold symmetry, and they too move about on hundreds of hydraulically operated tube feet. Sea stars and sea urchins are from a group known as echinoderms, a word meaning ‘spiny skins’. Sea urchin eggs have properties that make them important for medical research. Compounds extracted from marine organisms are initially tested to see whether they inhibit the production of rapidly dividing sea urchin eggs. If so, they may have potential to provide cures for AIDS, cancer and other diseases.

What do they look like? Regular urchins are spherical animals with a case or shell of close-fitting limy plates. Sea urchins have spines that protect them from predators. However, it is mostly the hard outer shell, from which the spines have usually broken off, that is found washed up on beaches.

Where do they live? Sea urchins are found in all of Western Australia's marine parks(they also live in all of Sarasota's bays!). They are most common in intertidal habitats and on shallow reefs, but have been found as deep as 7000 metres.

What they eat and how: They feed on kelp and other kinds of seaweeds. Due to their ability to reproduce rapidly when conditions become favourable, they can reach plague proportions, only to die in huge numbers when they eat out their food source.

Threats: In other parts of the world, people are one of their main predators. In some parts of the world, sea urchins are believed to be powerful aphrodisiacs. The roe is a prized delicacy in Japan, in islands of the Pacific and in European countries such as France, Italy and Greece.

Behaviour: They use the spines on the underside to move around, making them look like they are walking on stilts. Some tropical species, such as the flower urchin, have venom-tipped spines that can cause severe pain to careless divers.

Conservation status: Sea urchins are very common all around the Western Australian coast(And throughout Florida).

For most people, seagrass meadows don’t evoke nearly as much passion as more colorful, dramaticmarine habitats like coral reefs. But Dr. Giuseppe Di Carlo, CI’s Marine Climate Change Manager, sees seagrass beds in a different light.

“It’s exciting to discover the hidden magic of seagrasses. If you put a piece of seagrass in a tank in the lab, all the little creatures that inhabit the meadow slowly start emerging – crabs, small mollusks and other invertebrates make the tank come to life.”

The results of new research are as surprising as the hidden worlds seagrass meadows contain; in fact, preservation of these often overlooked ecosystems may prove essential in the global fight against climate change.

Vanishing Meadows

Seagrasses are flowering plants that migrated from land into the sea millions of years ago. Seventy-two species of seagrass inhabit shallow coastal waters across the planet’s tropical and temperate regions. Seagrass meadows provide prime nursery habitat for many fish species, as well as an essential food source for grazers like green sea turtles (Chelonia mydas) and manatees (Trichechus sp.).

Although corals and mangroves receive much more publicity, seagrass meadows are thought to be among the most threatened ecosystems on earth. A recent study by a group of seagrass experts supported by the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis found that seagrass meadows have been disappearing by about seven percent per year since 1990. Major threats to the ecosystems are caused by several human-induced factors, including destructive fishing, sediment pollution, coastal development and invasive species, many of which will be exacerbated by climate change.

Far-Reaching Impacts

So why should we care about seagrass meadows when so few people recognize them and they appear to have little connection to human well-being?

More than one billion people around the world live within 50 kilometers (less than 32 miles) of a seagrass meadow. People have been using seagrass for hundreds of years for purposes as varied as medicine, packing materials and animal feed. Many communities rely on the shallow waters inhabited by seagrasses for fishing and farming, and seagrass supports fish nurseries for a variety of species important to the commercial fish trade.

Furthermore, seagrasses provide many less obvious benefits important for all coastal communities. Dr. Di Carlo, who is also on the Steering Committee for the World Seagrass Association, emphasizes the connections between seagrasses and the environmental benefits we all rely on for survival. “Seagrass science isn't just about the plant – it’s about how these plants provide the foundation for an entire ecosystem to form.”

They protect coastlines from storms, stabilize sediment and transport nutrients throughout the ecosystem. The global value of this nutrient cycling alone has been estimated at about $1.9 trillion annually. In addition, the health of seagrass meadows is closely tied to that of mangrove and coral reef ecosystems, as many fish migrate between these habitats for food and shelter.

One of the most important benefits of seagrasses for the world’s oceans is carbon sequestration. In the same way that deforestation is one of the largest contributors to climate change, the loss of seagrass meadows releases large amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. The disappearance of seagrass may even make a more significant contribution to climate change than coral reef destruction, as seagrasses are more widely distributed across the oceans.

Dr. Michelle Waycott, Associate Professor at James Cook University and President of the World Seagrass Association, suggests that the decline of seagrass meadows may be a foregone conclusion unless people recognize their importance.

“For a long time, recognition of the loss of seagrass meadows has been overshadowed by the attention given to coral reefs, marshes and mangroves. We now know that seagrasses play an important role in connecting coastal ecosystems around the world…losing seagrass meadows will only speed up the loss of other ecosystems, causing more problems in the future.”

Expanding Our Knowledge

CI’s Climate Change team is committed to using every opportunity to fight what is arguably the biggest environmental issue of our time. In comparison with other marine habitats, seagrass studies on climate change have been few and far-between; the inter-connected nature of ecosystems makes it evident that more widespread and detailed studies are needed.

The Global Marine Species Assessment (GMSA) aims to fill this information gap. A collaboration between CI and IUCN, the GMSA recently assessed all 72 seagrass species for the risk of extinction under IUCN Red List criteria. Dr. Suzanne Livingstone, Program Officer for the GMSA, explains how the forthcoming outcomes of the assessment will be used.

“The results of this study will identify conservation priorities for CI's Marine Program, highlighting which seagrass species and regions are most in need of conservation action and further research.”

The expansion of seagrass knowledge is an important step in the fight against climate change. By incorporating it into our climate strategy, CI hopes to help provide a more secure future for generations to come.